When I told my Board at Responsive Caregivers of Hawai’i, where I serve as the President & CEO, that I’d be taking off five weeks to travel on the mainland in the spring, they were encouraging of me using some of the vacation time I’d accumulated after a year of riding the corona coaster. Our nonprofit organization, which offers programming for adults with developmental disabilities, has not only survived the public health emergency but is emerging as a leader among service providers and becoming an agency of choice among participants and their families.
After shuttering our adult day health program from March to November of last year, we were happy to obtain approval to reopen with limitations on the numbers of persons and with the proper safety measures in place. With the introduction of vaccines and an adequate cash flow, I felt comfortable taking the time off. The reliance on remote work has continued to prove beneficial and I can keep up with some of my tasks while on the road.
The journey started when my partner, Sam Yoder, left Honolulu on April 1st to pick up a new luxury motor coach in California, which he drove to Dallas. His mom, Geri (aka “Mama G”) and I flew to Dallas two weeks later and enjoyed some time with family there before making our way to see relatives in the Shreveport/Bossier City area of Louisiana. We also visited one of my favorite places, New Orleans for a few days.
After some setbacks, including the hospitalization of our beloved Mama G for a few days due to complications from congestive heart failure, we finally got medical clearance after purchasing an oxygen condenser and boarded the beautiful Prevost Millenium with our provisions and our two Yorkies, LuLu and Spike, in tow. Our journey toward our home state of Ohio was planned to allow for stops along the way in five states that I haven’t yet visited, including Arkansas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, Kansas and Iowa. Sam also needed to visit Oklahoma to check off all 50 states.
Our first stop was Hot Springs, Arkansas which one of my Board members had recommended. Hot Springs is a city in the Ouachita Mountains of Arkansas. It’s known for naturally heated springs, many of them in Hot Springs National Park, where we parked the RV at Gulpha Gorge Campground, which offers picturesque camping spots along the river bank, with full hook-ups for only $30 per night. We got a half off discount for senior citizens. Not a bad deal considering the water and electrical hook-ups enable full use all of the luxuries on board the coach, including the full size marble shower.
I’m not much for camping but this form of travel is considered glamping. Indeed, my friend Laura in New Orleans calls the Prevost a “Ritz on Wheels.” We have a king size bed, comfortable living room furniture, dinette, full size refrigerator/freezer, washer/dryer, and even a Starbucks machine to make iced lattes on board the Prevost, which is the ultra luxury brand for tour buses. Indeed, many people stop to stare and wonder who’s inside. Little do they know, there’s two lucky dogs on the bus curled up in their bed thinking that all dogs live this way.
After resting for the night and having some breakfast sandwiches with guava jam we brought with us from Hawai’i, we got ready and headed into town. The resort town of Hot Springs is a hybrid of sorts. One side of the Main Street includes hotels, boutique shops and restaurants, while the other side belongs to the National park with its medicinal waters, miles of hiking trails and the historic Bathhouse Row.
In 1832, 40 years before the creation of Yellowstone National Park, Congress established Hot Springs Reservation to protect hot springs flowing from Hot Springs Mountain. In 1921, Hot Springs became the 18th national park in the National Park Service. Today the park encompasses 5,500 acres and protects eight historic bathhouses with the former luxurious Fordyce Bathhouse housing the park’s visitor center. The entire Bathhouse Row area is a National Historic Landmark District that contains the grandest collection of bathhouses of its kind in North America.
We visited Quapaw Baths & Spa, the perfect place to immerse in Hot Springs’ acclaimed thermal waters. The Quapaw was built in a Spanish Colonial Revival style and sits on the site of two previous bathhouses, the Horseshoe and Magnesia. It was established in 1922 and named after a Native American tribe that once held land in the area.
For centuries, Native Americans, early European explorers, and visitors from around the world have come to the mineral-rich natural hot springs to bathe in the healing waters. Early explorers gave the first detailed account of bathing in the hot springs, “We found at the Hot Springs an Open Log-Cabin and a few huts of split boards, all calculated for summer encampment, and which have been erected by persons resorting to the Springs for the recovery of their health.”
Our bathhouse experience was more modern than that witnessed by explorers and offered amenities such as cold peppermint towels. There are various spa services, including a variety of massage therapies as well as facials that can be added. You can join others in the public baths or have private individual or couples bathing experiences. There’s also a café offering refreshments.
The entire time we were there I couldn’t get the lyrics to the old Barbara Mandrell song, “Fast Lanes and Country Roads” out of my head: “Down in Hot Springs Arkansas, you can get an overhaul. I sure could use one.”
This seemed fitting as Mama G is on a path to restore her own health. Even though she didn’t join us in the thermal baths, she was able to walk around the visitor center without having to use oxygen and thankfully her health continues to improve.
On our way out of town, we drove by the Bill Clinton Boyhood Home. Also known as the Birnbaum-Shubetz House, it is a historic house at 1011 Park Avenue. Built about 1896 and redesigned in the Tudor Revival in 1938, it was the home of President Clinton between 1954 and 1961, teenage years in which he first determined to enter politics. In addition to this national historic significance, it is locally notable as an example of Tudor Revival architecture. The house, which was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1995, is a private residence and is not open to the public.
We marveled at the lakes and hills with lush green trees and yellow fields with resting cows as we made our way across Arkansas and into Oklahoma on our way to our next destination, Broken Bow, OK.
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